Not at this Hour – Prague, Czech Republic

By: Mark Jenkins

Not at this Hour
Prague, Czech Republic

I imagine arriving early evening at the very latest. Instead, my train clanks into Prague after 11:30. Not the main train station either. I make my way off the lit platform down through whitewashed caverns to the metro station. I look for a phone to tell my Czech friend, Jan, I had finally arrived. Naturally the entire station is closed except for the restrooms, and they look ready to close.

I dump my bags at the first telephone and reach into my pocket for the few coins I got back as change when the Czech conductor told me I had to pay 80 crowns to supplement the train ticket I purchased in Frankfurt. But this phone just has a small slot at the bottom of the phone for a phone card. Next to it, a smaller coin operated phone, very low to the ground for a child or someone in a wheel chair. I get on my knees, drop a few coins into it and try dialing my friend’s cell phone. It just beeps at me, not explaining why I wasn’t talking to my friend.

An unknown elderly lady, one of the few people in the station besides those who limp off the train, comes out of the shadows to tap my shoulder, “You need accommodation?”

“I already have some, thanks,” I say offhandedly. She disappears with the rest of the small crowd. What is the problem with this phone? Prague’s metro system shuts down at midnight, so I head down to catch one to the center of the city and hope I have better luck there.

After a few minutes on the deserted train, I get off at Vavlavske namesti (Weneslas Square) since I know Jan’s apartment isn’t far from it. I ride the escalator to the top, the large statue of St. Weneslas on his horse is right next to me. I’m excited to be in Prague and want to dig my camera out, but push off such feelings for now. The square is full of people on a Friday night stroll. Several pairs of pay phones are on the square. I stop at a street vendor for a bottle of Coke and more change. No coin slot in the first pay phone again, so I check the other one. I drop a few coins in and try dialing again. Nothing but more beeping, and the phone keeps my money. I stop at a different vendor and ask if she knows where I could get a phone card. “Not at this hour,” she says.

Other than restaurants and a few tiny currency exchange booths, little is open. I know Jan isn’t far away from here, but I don’t know which direction. In some e-mail he gave his address, but I only wrote down his office address, thinking he would still be at work when I arrived.
I try another phone, shove the few remaining coins in. This phone isn’t any friendlier. I dial an operator to make a collect call, but she quickly says, “You can’t make a collect call to a cell phone…click.” Who else could I call? My parents wouldn’t be helpful or happy to know I was stranded in Prague at midnight.

I look around the square, well more a long rectangle actually. A few of the buildings are hotels, expensive ones, but hotels all the same. I have a credit card with an almost incomprehensible limit. Even at a ludicrous rate, I could afford one night in one of the marble tiled monstrosities. In one last circle I walk into a hotel. The polished floor and gaudy interior contrasts with my too traveled appearance. I dump my luggage at the foot of the desk and ask the hotel clerk if there are any rooms available. He smiles, explaining with the music festival this week all the rooms are taken. I repeat my plight to him. He suggests somewhere else for me to spend the night, producing a brochure to flip through. It looks fine, if a little expensive at sixty-one dollars a night. I ask where it is. He shows me on a map. This hotel can arrange for a taxi to take me there and bring me back to the city next day. I quickly agree. He calls the other hotel. Even through the language barrier the other hotel manager sounds less then excited, but he contacts a taxi to come pick me up. He starts handing me pamphlets one by one, as if he’s cleaning out a drawer on tours of Prague, the Czech Republic, and finally restaurants in Prague. He explains each in case I couldn’t decipher from an overload of pictures what they are about. I drop down onto a leather couch behind me, waiting for a taxi to appear.

Eventually, a guy in a black leather jacket knocks on the door. I get up, ready to get to the other hotel. I thank the hotel clerk as I grab my backpack. A bellhop grabs my other bag, tossing it into the trunk of a taxi. Not just some cheap yellow car but a black BMW with taxi stripes and a lit taxi sign slapped on top.

If Prague ever has a Formula One race, I met one of the local drivers. The streets of Prague blur by as the car reaches its maximum RPM. He stops for little beyond a stoplight and a few tipsy pedestrians, but for them he merely swerves onto tram tracks in the middle of the road. Even at quick speeds, the hotel is not as close to the center of Prague as suggested. We come to a halt in front of a gate. I get out, letting my heart slow down. The driver hefts my bag out of the trunk.

“You need to pay me,” he says.
“Oh right, of course,” I reply wondering where someone from this hotel is. “How much?”
“Three hundred crown.” He quickly gets back in his car and shuts the door.

The gate is bolted. Next to it are four small plastic boxes, each with a button and a label. I press the button beside the hotel’s name. I thought it an intercom, but I don’t hear a voice or even some kind of buzz. I know the other hotel called ahead, but no sign of anyone on the other side of the gate, so I turn around, rap on the window of the taxi. Annoyed, he looks at me pointing to the boxes at the gate, but finally the hotel owner, manager, and employee comes to let me in. The hotel, actually just a house, is set behind another building. He takes me to the basement showing me my room, how the TV works, how to change through five channels of people speaking in Czech in case I wanted to stay up all night in a daze. Continuing on autopilot, he shows me my very own bathroom across the hall and which little key opens it.

I follow him back up the steps to a table. He carefully copies everything from my passport in case I slash a pillow. I count out the money for the room; thankful I changed some money before leaving home. He kindly subtracts the taxi fare from the price of the room. I have just enough to pay him, looking at my nearly empty wallet.

“When would you like breakfast tomorrow,” he asks, ready to return to sleep.
“8 am would be good.”
“Oh, so early?”
“Yes, well, I have to get in touch with my friend as soon as possible. I tried to call him already and it wouldn’t work.”
“Well then, how about nine o’clock?”
“Well, okay.”

I unroll the scrap of paper clutched in my hand with my friend’s phone number. It is nearly 1 am already, but I know Jan wonders what happened to me.

“You can call him tonight if you wish,” He goes to another room and returns carrying a phone. He looks at the number on my paper.

“Cell phone calls cost twenty crowns a minute,”
“Okay,” I pick up the phone punching in the number. It is ringing. Finally.
“Hello,” says the voice on the other line. It is sleepy, but familiar.
“Hi Jan, it’s Mark. I made it.”
“Mark, I was wondering. I couldn’t sleep because I knew you should be here. Where are you?”
“I’m in a hotel. I couldn’t get any of the pay phones to work.”
“I’ll come get you.”
“Well I already paid and it’s late. Why don’t you come in the morning?”
“Oh okay, where are you?”
“Umm well, here.” I hand the phone to the owner staring at his wristwatch.

A quick series of exchanges and he hands the phone back to me.

“Do you know where that is?”
“I think so, you are pretty far away.”
“Okay,”
“Get some sleep. I’m glad to know you are here. I will be there after nine. How was the train?”
“Very long. I’m glad to be here too. Look I’m being timed, so I have to go.”
“Oh okay, goodnight Mark.”
“Goodnight Jan.”

I quickly hang up the phone as the owner writes down the length of the call like a track coach.

“That will be four hundred crowns. I also take dollars and Deutchmarcs,” he says.
I dig through my wallet and find a few hundred crown notes along with a few dollars. I put down what money I have, remembering I shoved some other money into a pair of socks.

“Just a second.” I go down to my room fishing through my duffle bag for more money.
“Okay there,” I give him the rest.
“Thank you,” His pile of money has grown quickly in a short amount of time.

I say goodnight and head for my room, happy to finally get hold of Jan. I go back down to my room. I dump everything off the bed. The sheets consist of a one-piece quilt that wraps around. My feet and ankles stick out, even when I pretend to be short. Regardless, I quickly fall asleep.

The next morning I roll out of bed. I want to be ready to leave when my friend Jan finds this place. I don’t want to miss the breakfast I paid for either. I grab the handle on the door and give it a pull. Nothing. I locked it almost in my sleep last night. I play with the only key it accepts, finally pulling my way into the hall and to the bathroom. I feel for the tiny nub and turn on a light. I considered rinsing off the travel dust last night, but couldn’t muster much beyond brushing my teeth and a quick splash of water. I step into the tiled stall, studying the lever for a second and twist it until water spurts out with the consistency of a water fountain.

After my shower, the proprietor comes down with a tray of food for me and for the other room. He points to my tray and to the other tray several times just to be sure I understand which tray is mine. I didn’t realize I look so malnourished. Breakfast resembles a cold lunch with slices of meat and cheese arranged around kiwi fruit. I turn on the television to see familiar Sesame Street puppets speaking Czech with wonderful fluency. If I could manage even half of what rolls off their cloth tongues.

Jan arrives shortly. We’re glad to see each other again, though I’m happier to see him. He supports my suspicion of the less than central location of this pension house when he says it took half an hour of riding trams and the subway to get here. “How much did you pay for this place,” he asks. Jan laughs when I tell him $60. “Mark, you spent your week’s budget on one night here.”

I stuff everything back into my bags and finish the rest of my breakfast. I find the owner to hand back keys and let him know I’m leaving. He produces a handful of business cards, shoving them into my hand and Jan’s in case we ever want to bestow the honor of paying a fistful of Czech Crowns onto any of our friends. They politely disappear into our pockets as we walk ourselves past the gate and down the street to a tram stop. Jan can’t believe the audacity of the hotel owner. “I wanted to tear his business card up right there,” he says. We laugh as we wait for a tram, unable to think of anyone to pass these cards to.

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